


Kofi Aromo

by jwdickson



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Blackwatch Era, Gen, Pre-Recall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2021-02-16 10:03:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21506077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jwdickson/pseuds/jwdickson
Summary: In the wake of the Venice Incident, Moira O'Deorain and Gabriel Reyes have a quiet cup of coffee in Geneva. Motivations are explored and catchphrases are terribly misused.
Relationships: Moira O'Deorain & Reaper | Gabriel Reyes
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	Kofi Aromo

**Author's Note:**

> I've always felt like the world's most ubiquitous coffee shop in Overwatch doesn't get nearly enough love, so I figured I'd have everyone's favorite morally questionable Blackwatch agents enjoy a cup or two.

"I'm no stranger to ruination, Gabriel." Dr. Moira O'Deorain raised her coffee (a blonde roast advertised by Kofi Aromo as "the best wake-up call in the world") to her lips. The smoothness of the cream, the slight sweetness of the added sugar, and the spice of the dash of nutmeg moved delicately across her palate. "But even I have to admit that Venice was a foolhardy move."

Gabriel Reyes stared into the middle distance, seemingly lost in thought. Outside the coffee shop, cars hummed past, pedestrians plodded their way down the sidewalks, and life in Geneva otherwise proceeded apace.

Finally, the Blackwatch commander looked up at Moira, his mouth a grim line. "Someone had to do something."

Moira smoothed her tie and leaned back in her chair. "Did it have to be you?"

"I'm not one of your rabbits, Doc. You can't flay me open to see what makes me tick." It was Gabe's turn to sample his coffee. It was black, whatever the Kofi Aromo house blend happened to be. Moira knew he didn't give a damn. Things like creamer and sweetener were luxuries not often available in a battlefield context, but awareness and lucidity were necessities.  _ You learned to drink your coffee straight and not bitch about it _ , he was known to say.  _ Anything else was fucking around. _

"I don't expect I have to," Moira said. She examined Gabe for a moment, her gaze impassive, analytical. He was in his civvies: jeans, dark shirt, woolen overcoat, fingerless gloves, the ever-present stocking cap. "You are an individual of intense loyalty. A family man  _ and _ a company man. You see the big picture, can tell that Talon is teetering on the edge of power.  _ Actual  _ power, like what Overwatch wields. And that, somehow…" Moira tapped one of her long fingernails against the plexiglas tabletop. "Has made you desperate."

Gabe didn't respond, but his jaw worked, as though he were trying and failing to find a flaw in her analysis.

Moira knew he wouldn't. The human animal, as well as its genetic structure, had been a source of fascination to her for as long as she could remember. The push-and-pull of mammal brain and reptile brain, the modern and the primal, the principled and the instinctive. She prided herself on being able to read others. And Gabe…well, he was easier than most. And more dangerous. Loyalty in a man like Gabriel Reyes was a zero-sum game.

Moira had no doubt that, given the right provocation, Gabriel Reyes could bring Overwatch to its knees. "So what did you ask me here to confess, Gabriel?"

Gabe raised an eyebrow. "'Confess?'"

"That's what they called it when I was younger," Moira said, gesturing while keeping her thumb and index finger curled around her biodegradable cup. "You wish to unburden yourself. And I'm the only one who can listen."

"That's pretty damn self-important of you."

"Process of elimination." Moira swirled her coffee. "Jesse won't listen to you because he's too much like you. He feels betrayed by the fact that you defenestrated Antonio Bartalotti with a shotgun. Genji is too bound up in his own pain. I expect this was his last mission with Blackwatch." A derisive growl from the commander. "And your wife simply wouldn't have the context to understand. I'm the only one who remains."

Gabe smiled ruefully. "Am I that predictable?"

"We all are." Moira shrugged and took another swallow of coffee. She idly wondered if a slice of butter cake might go well with it, passing the moments until Gabe spoke again.

Gabe leaned his elbows on the table and met Moira's gaze. "I'm dying."

This was not news to Moira. Dr. Ziegler's expertise was nanomedicine, not genetics. As much as Moira was sure it had galled Overwatch's resident medical prodigy, Dr. Ziegler had been forced to consult with the Blackwatch geneticist on Gabe's condition.

The disease process currently destabilizing Gabriel Reyes at a cellular level was not unknown. It affected about one in every ten individuals who had undergone the physical and genetic conditioning of the United States's Soldier Enhancement Program and presented a one hundred percent fatality rate. The only reason it hadn't turned into a public relations disaster for the US was mostly due to the fact that nobody  _ cared _ about the US any longer. So far as most people were concerned, the whole country could get swallowed up by its lawless southwest and nobody would blink an eye. The world had much bigger problems to be getting on with.

Moira watched Gabe, weighing whether she should indicate that she knew already. She was surprised it wasn't obvious. Then again, he had never been nearly as  _ observant _ as she was.

"That is unfortunate," Moira said, finally. "You have my condolences."

Gabe started off chuckling into his coffee. After a few moments, the chuckle escalated into genuine laughter, and he ultimately threw his head back in a guffawing fit that had irritated people in the coffee shop turning to see what was so goddamned funny.

For the first time in the entire conversation, Moira felt uncomfortable. She pulled her coat--a thin affair of quilted white fabric cut to three-quarter length--closer around her narrow torso and took a self-conscious sip of her coffee.

Eventually, Gabe's laughter died down, and he leaned his forearms back on the table, scrubbing a stray tear from one eye. "Hoo boy, haven't laughed like that in a while."

Moira's dignity prickled with affront. "What, may I ask, was so amusing?"

"Me," Gabe said. He took a deep breath and sighed it out, a sober expression overcoming his tired features. Had the bags under his eyes been that deep, before? Moira couldn't recall. "Doc says I've got another two years, three at the most, before the cellular damage begins to affect my nervous system. I can feel it happening already, in the tips of my fingers. They tingle, sometimes. No sensation." He rubbed his fingertips together pensively, as though trying to dig something from his memory.

"Neuropathy" was the word Gabe was looking for. Moira didn't supply it. "That's what the literature suggests, yes. But I'm sure Doctor Ziegler will have identified any one of a half-dozen possible therapies for you within the next year." Moira tried to keep the disdain from her voice. Sort of.

"I might just be another ground-pounder at heart," Gabe said, "but that doesn't mean I'm stupid. I know how medical specializations work. This...what I have, it's genetic. That's not Doc's monkey tree. That's yours."

Moira paused, cup at the level of her chin. One eyebrow rose. "Are you asking for my help?"

"Jack only sees the parts of the world that are in broad daylight," Gabe said. "That's what he wants to save. What Gerard wants to save. But they don't realize that  _ all _ of it needs saving. Even the parts not fit for primetime media. Morrison may be Overwatch's golden boy, but  _ I _ need to stay its strong right arm for as long as I can.  _ However _ I can. And I know that, with you, the ends justify whatever means you require."

Moira tapped the side of her cup with her index finger, dark, spidery veins stark against her pale skin. Steam had ceased to curl from the mouthpiece of the lid. The coffee was perfectly warm, but wouldn't be for long. Soon, it would be cold, and the cold would make it bitter. "Any therapy I have in mind for you would be experimental. Untried. You'd be a guinea pig." Gabe deserved the truth, if nothing else. "And there's no guarantee it will save you."

"I don't need saving," Gabe said. "I'm a soldier from way back. I just need to be put back together so I can keep. On. Fighting." He extended a gloved hand, broad and heavy. "Agreed?"

Moira's eyes lingered on the hand, flicked to the commander's determined, weary gaze, then returned. Her mind was already moving, the wheels of it clicking away, analyzing the problem from multiple angles, reviewing the known facts surrounding the SEP initiative's public failures. She imagined what she could learn from attempting to treat the cellular dysplasia, the genetic  _ drift _ caused by the super soldier process. She'd learned so much already based solely on the Overwatch medical database's entries re: Gabe and his unique abilities. Some aspects had even been adopted into her own arsenal for field use. Forcible extraction of nanobiotic energies from a living target, to start with, and then a refined version of what Gabe called his "shadow step".

What miracles could she manage with the man himself, and not just his data?

The right corner of Moira's lips quirked. She drank off the remainder of her coffee, set the empty cup aside, and took Gabriel's sturdy hand in her own lithe grasp. "Agreed. As the good doctor herself says, heroes never die. And neither should you."


End file.
